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When you find yourself in a pitched battle with a ruthless foe, it’s nice to have a seasoned veteran on your side, particularly one who has served time in the enemy ranks.
The first part of the book is an analysis of the Clinton Administration’s failure to protect America against the looming terrorist threat, which has since become reality. The reader’s blood is guaranteed to boil as Horowitz relentlessly details Clinton’s refusal to address the issue. Horowitz unearths the roots of all this in a 60s pacifism that morphed into a pro communist, America-hating philosophy spewed by people like Ron Dellums and Tom Hayden. Horowitz understands the nuts and bolts of political wars and he shows how Republicans must modify their strategies if they want to win elections. He notes that Republicans tend to talk in policy and management terms, while Democrats tell stories that resonate with their audience’s emotions (as Ronald Reagan used to do). Republicans too often let the Democrats define the terms of the debate, and find themselves trying to explain why they are not heartless Nazis who want to tax-cut and deregulate their way to destroying the schools, the country, the planet, and, of course, "the children." Republicans, in Horowitz’s view, need to remember that success in war requires movement. The Republicans cannot afford to stand still and be pounded by relentless Democrat attacks. When Democrats assault Republicans with lies about their pet issues, Republicans need to answer the lies with the facts. When Democrats say Republicans want to starve the poor, Republicans must answer that socialist welfare schemes destroy lives and families. When Democrats want to spend ever more on education, Republicans must ask, who has been in charge of the schools and inner city governments for the last 50 years? Energy policy? Jimmy Carter gave us gas lines, Ronald Reagan gave us lower fuel prices. Social Security? This Democrat program is a fiscal disaster, and only a privately funded pension plan will solve the crisis. In another section of the book, Horowitz sketches portraits of various Weathermen luminaries – Bill Ayers, Kathy Soliah and Bernadine Dohrn, among others. With first-hand information from the period, he ruthlessly exposes their lies and distortions, and shows how unrepentant they still are – even after many of them were pardoned by Bill Clinton. Kathy (Soliah) Rosenberg, for example, whines that the bomb she helped plant "didn’t even go off." Dohrn calls her famous grisly celebration of the Sharon Tate murders "a joke." Ayers noted regretfully (literally hours before the 9/11 attacks) that he hadn’t done enough bombing during the 60s. Predictably, he and his significant other – Dohrn – hold prestigious positions at major universities. The book concludes with a psychological dissection of the Clintons. Horowitz points out that while Bill Clinton really had no firm conviction beyond the advancement of Bill Clinton, his wife is quite another case. Hillary comes from a long line of totalitarian thinkers who really believe that all is justified in the pursuit of the Promised Land of socialism. Since that dream will never be realized, her mission becomes a sort of idolatry – a limitless passion for her own self-aggrandizement. Nobody understands leftists as David Horowitz does – and no one is more determined to stop them. (Spence Publishing, 2002, 272 pps., $27.95) |
David Horowitz is just such a soldier. A former radical leftist who literally stood on the ramparts in the 1960s, Horowitz has earned a reputation as a strategist who knows how the other side thinks. His new book, How to Beat the Democrats, is a tactical field manual combined with insightful political and psychological analysis.
